With all the polarization in our society, there seems to be a lack of guiding principles or common cause that might bring us together, to find greater meaning. Basically, what I’m trying to say is, are we all on our phones too much?
We lack the sense of community that was normal in past centuries, where people would gather routinely for religious or other communal events. The “bowling alone” phenomenon doesn’t help our cohesiveness as a society.
The proliferation of social media has also allowed any number of views to become popular and even commonplace, no matter how untethered to the truth. In the past, the mainstream news media were the gatekeepers of what made news legitimate and what was patently false.
We’ve also lived through a century of relative peace and abundance in the West. This raised a generation that had not experienced significant hardships, but rather one that was accustomed to increasing wealth, creating both apathy and resentment. Gen Z may be anesthetized by TikTok, but still bitter towards those in power for creating a gig economy with few benefits and ridiculously expensive homes.
So what am I really trying to say here? I'm not sure anymore... I wanted to talk about the meaning of life. Victor Frankl, the renowned Jewish psychologist, suggested we can find meaning in any circumstance, even in a Nazi death camp. He miraculously survived concentration camps in Auschwitz and Dachau to write his seminal work, Man’s Search for Meaning, where he argues that meaning can be found in the least hopeful places on earth. But we must create it.
Some of us can do this more easily than others, Frankl freely admits. While it would be nice to think every one of us can will ourselves out of a funk, context matters. For an immigrant coming from a war-torn country, life satisfaction may come from being in a safe, secure country like Canada, even if his or her job may not be that fulfilling. Those with immense wealth, by contrast, may find that they are never satisfied and can never have enough.
Even those of us who have the ideal work-life balance (I may be referring to myself) can struggle, ironically, if there is not enough struggle. For this problem, there may be an easy answer: More struggle.
Psychiatrist Anna Lembke, author of Dopamine Nation: Finding Balance in the Age of Indulgence, suggests purposely creating challenges in our lives – to create some harmless friction if life seems too easy or routine. To be clear, this is advice for the privileged, not something you would tell a new immigrant to Canada or, to put it in starker terms, someone like Frankl who survived a concentration camp. This is for those of us who can’t live without our phones for twenty seconds.
I've tested her theory with some success. Completely unintentionally, I challenged myself this past winter by biking in freezing cold temperatures. This was not always easy. As I struggled to get enough oxygen through my frozen-solid face mask, I sometimes thought to myself, What the heck am I doing? But by the time I got home and tore off the layers of sweaty clothes, I had no regrets.
Another absurd thing I tried was Ukrainian dancing at the ripe old age of 46. Again, What the heck am I doing, jumping in the air with my toes pointed down?! I'm a Mennonite who struggles with moving to music! But do I enjoy it? Finally, in my second year of pointed toes, I can say that I do.
It's good to take on something new, even something you may not be good at. I know, easier said than done. It took me, what, 25 years to get the courage to start winter biking? And just 40 years, if I had started when I was six, to begin Ukrainian dancing?
In the end, these activities may not be making for a better world. But for a time, they keep me off my phone.
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